Poppies in London

Working on an international project, such as the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, we travel for various meetings with our client and with our consultants. During a recent visit to our engineer’s office in London for a series of coordination sessions we had an opportunity to do some exploring. We made our way to the Tower of London where we knew an installation titled Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red was underway. The installation was comprised of ceramic poppies created by artist Paul Cummings and staged by designer Tom Piper. Symbols of remembrance that stem from the trench warfare in the poppy fields of Belgium during World War I, poppies have become an emblem of the fallen soldier. Marking the centenary of the First World War, the flowers flood the moat around the tower with red. They appear to pour from a window at the perimeter wall and flow around the structure like a river. Each of the 888,246 poppies represents a British fatality. A poetic reminder to our generation what devastating consequences war brings.